


where the river meets

by LadyAllana



Category: JYJ (Band), Super Junior
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Angst, Fluff, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Suicide, Jaejoong is an idiot in love, M/M, Triggers, he also needs a big hug
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-04-26
Updated: 2016-05-09
Packaged: 2018-06-04 16:37:12
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 1,893
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6666181
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LadyAllana/pseuds/LadyAllana
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Jaejoong hears him singing in the hospital and consequently manages to dedicate three full albums and eleven singles to him.</p><p>Junsu and Heechul are around for emotional support and warm hugs.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> This was supposed to be a fluffy one shot about Jaejoong obsessing over Yoochun's voice and being adorably clueless... 
> 
> but then I accidentally deleted the original story and what's left on my phone became this painful mess. I'm really sorry >

_“where the river meets_  
deep down the angry waves  
if only I could get there once  
i’ll sob and laugh  
until my heart bursts someday  
and I’ll put an end to a long journey  
without any regrets’’ 

 

 

The official report writes it down as a suicide attempt.

 

Jaejoong calls it a mistake.

 

‘’You are an idiot” is what Heechul tells him in reply. There is a tense, worried smile on his too pale face, the corners of his mouth straining to keep up the action, cheeks sunken in like an anorexic porcelain doll. If Jaejoong can gather enough of his wits to focus, he might realize that this is the first time he is seeing him stand unaided in the last two months.

 

“I know it’s hard taking care of me… but you didn’t need to do _this._ ”

 

“Oh shut up hyung, I fell. I wouldn’t drown myself for your sorry ass.”

 

Heechul hastily wipes of a rebellious tear off his skeleton like cheek, snorting way too nasally and wet.

 

Everything is bright, way too bright and fuzzy.

 

His head is throbbing and there is the constant beeping of the heart monitor and it doesn’t take a genius too add the half formed shaped in front of his eyes together and realize that he is in the VIP ward of the hospital he has been way too acquainted for the last six months.

 

Heechul, still in his signature hospital gown – because the cast is too heavy to bother with the pants and no, I will not wear the Hello Kitty nightgown in public Joongie- is trying to make his best impression of a man watching a makjang drama.

 

His hand is trembling on the remote and he is too busy biting his lip to pay attention to the ajumma screaming on the screen…

 

He makes a horrible actor for someone who is actually acting.

 

But he has been out of business for a while, so Jaejoong decides that he can let it go, just this once.

 

**

 

He doesn’t remember losing consciousness or the cold, he supposes it has been cold for a while now, maybe even before that rainy night he decided to stroll through that bridge.

 

But there is no point in straying or telling the doctor all this with Heechul pretending to be asleep in the bed next to his so he gets right to the point.

 

“Where is the other doctor?”

 

_The one with the nice voice._

 

“Jaejoong shi, I’ve been your doctor ever since you’ve been brought in here last night. We were really careful about not revealing your identity but… “

 

Jaejoong is sure there had been another doctor, with another white coat and a warm voice that stopped the trembling…

 

…but maybe

 

“Are you sure?”

 

“You were brought up here the moment we were sure you weren’t in immediate danger. There was no other doctor, or nurse besides Mrs. Kim here for that matter.”

 

…maybe he is finally going mad.

 

Nurse Kim, a lady in her early fifties smiles at him, a blank, empty smile and approaches to the bed able fingers ghosting over his veiny hands.

 

Jaejoong closes his eyes.

 

He isn’t sure if he ever wants to open them again.


	2. 1. Healing

It’s not long after he and Junsu finally, finally decide to cut all their ties with the company when the accident happens. Junsu and Sungmin both adore musicals and have more or less the same taste, but as they evolve and spread out their wings it’s obvious that they don’t quite match anymore. There is always something missing in the melody, they are always one note short of harmony, it’s a gradual process but by the end of it there is nothing these two childhood friends can do but part their ways, after spending the last 5 years as a duo. 

 

As for Jaejoong, he is so tired, constantly, morbidly tired that he is at the point of breaking down. Heechul has been in an out of the hospital for months now, depressed and all the more helpless for it because he is supposed to be taking care of them. Yongwoon isn’t any better, drinking day and night now that their schedule is clear. Yunho is wrung so tight that Jaejoong is afraid if he approaches him, the leader will break.

 

He can’t let Yunho break.

 

So Jaejoong stays quiet and withers away, stuck in an endless rotation between the hospital and the bars he has to carry Yongwoon out with Yunho, or Jungsoo or with a manager. It’s not until Heechul finds him crying in the little bathroom adjacent to his hospital bed that he starts thinking about getting away. Heechul, unable to walk even with his crutches makes him lay down on the bed with him, strokes his hair until his sobs quiet down. Then he finally lets go of the breath he has been holding in for months and says: ‘’Joongie, you have to get out.’’

 

**

To think about it, Jaejoong doesn’t really know how he came to be close with Junsu. Somewhere along the way the boy who was desperate to get his voice back had become the best vocalist of SM, Jaejoong is willing to admit defeat because Junsu has worked hard for it. 

 

Jaejoong thinks that maybe it was at a family concert where he first saw the twinges of restlessness in Junsu’s lithe frame, the itching fingers and the twitchy legs. Maybe it was during one of Kangta sunbae’s songs, when the boy sitting next to him in a well cut suit way too big for his young shoulders had to stop his feet from following the rhythm. He doesn’t remember the exact date or the exact scene but Jaejoong thinks that one unforgotten melody is the reason they managed to come so far. 

 

It’s because of that one song from a long ago Jaejoong was drawn to Junsu like a moth to the flame, and found a confidante, a good friend. And it’s how they got to spend more and more time together, with Junsu dragging him to musicals and Jaejoong taking him shopping for a complete style change.

 

By the time Jaejoong convinced him to buy his very first pair of leather pants, they had become best friends.

***

Later, he will go over a thousand times. He will wonder whether it was a hallucination or an angel. But at that very moment, soaked to the bone, shivering violently and eyelids heavier than bricks, Jaejoong just can’t stay awake.

 

“Did he jump?” he hears a woman.

 

“Seems the type, isn’t he? Look at his hair.” It’s a man’s voice now.

 

Jaejoong would like to add, there is nothing wrong with bleached, platinum blond hair when it’s styled well ok?

 

“You don’t know him? He is Summer!”

 

Someone puts a heavy thing- a blanket- over him and it just makes him feel colder.

 

“His stats don’t look good; we need to get him warmed up.”

 

“Seriously, you don’t know him?”

 

“Dr. Kim please get a hold of yourself.”

 

“I can’t believe he would do this to himself, to his fans… Doesn’t he think about Yunho at all? Poor oppa...”

 

“Dr. Kim!”

 

He falls asleep then.

 

And wakes up to an angel singing.

 

***

 

‘’You’re an idiot” says Heechul, a tense worried smile on his pale face. It makes him look a bit like a broken crown. If Jaejoong can gather enough of his wits to focus he might realize that this is the first time he has seen Heechul standing unaided in the last month, ever since the elder had his last surgery. “I know it’s hard, taking care of me but… you didn’t need to do… this.”

 

“Oh, shut up hyung, I fell. I wouldn’t drown myself for your sorry ass.”

 

There is a stray tear making its run down Heechul’s cheek, which he tries to wipe away before Jaejoong notices.

 

“Junsu is in the cafeteria with your noona, I don’t know which one.”

 

He sits by Jaejoong’s skin and bones body then, his leg not strong enough to support him upright for long periods of time. They must look like a portrait of destruction, Jaejoong thinks. After all this time, it’s still hard to understand how they became like this.

 

From best idols Korea had seen to a sick, addicted parody of themselves.

 

“It’s over Joongie. Fall or not. The attorney can use this as a suicide attempt and the company won’t take the risk. So Junsu is going to take you to Nagoya and there you two can rest and make the album I knew you guys were planning about.”

 

Jaejoong tries to gulp but his throat is too dry from all the water he has swallowed to stay afloat.

 

“What about-“ the words beg to him to not to get out. It feels like a betrayal. Finally, it feels like an end even though they spent months talking about how Jaejoong could cut of his strings around the same time Junsu’s contract end, it should feel like a fresh start but he just feels like a failure.

 

“What about you, hyung?”

 

“Yongwoonie won’t be back for another 2 years. It’s going to be hard for Yunho but the company already has plans for a solo comeback. He wants to stay, he always has.”

 

He squeezes Jaejoongs hand, careful of the needles. 

 

“You know that I always wanted to be an actor right? I’ll be free, I’ll be fine.”

***

It’s kind of complicated afterwards. There is no official statement per say, but there are rumors going around. Fans are defending him at first and at one point it even gets confusing for him. He doesn’t really remember how he came to be on that bridge or how he hit the cold water, so slowly the imagination; his, the fans, the lawyers- takes over, leaving him with the shakes and the tears and a headache he can’t ever completely shake off.

 

But things get better slowly. 

 

Yunho has a collab project with the soloist Changmin. Heechul finds himself a drama and a variety show to host. Sungmin debuts as a musical actor, which Junsu flies in to watch three times, each time getting more and more envious promising once they are back, he will do the same.

 

There is a calm happiness slowly settling in, in the confident way Sungmin takes his final bow on stage, in the easy harmony of Yunho and the new boy as they dance in front of thousands for the first time. Jaejoong can already see the fanfiction pouring. 

 

He spends a whole night crying when Heechul has to get hit by a truck in the stupid drama and falls into hospital. 

 

Sends him a thousand and one stupid emojis when he has his first onscreen kiss.

 

All the while Jaejoong and Junsu spend their days and months holed up in a little apartment in Nagoya, trying to get to know each other and harmonize.

 

Junsu goes out one day and comes back his hair pink.

 

Jaejoong tries taking Japanese cuisine courses.

 

Junsu learns how to break dance, body obviously born for the rhythm.

 

Jaejoong tries to gain a few pounds.

 

Junsu finds a Japanese girl friend who is studying Korean literature, grows out of the white shirts and gets his ears pierced.

 

Jaejoong composes a whole album written to that imaginary voice.


End file.
